Not Even Fate
by dragonFELL
Summary: It all begins when Snow, leader of AVALANCHE, recruits ex-SOLDIER Lightning to overthrow the evil corporation known as Shinra. Little does Lightning know: they will end up saving the Planet. FFVII plot with FFXIII and FFVII characters.
1. Bombing Mission

**Chapter 1 ~ Bombing Mission**

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><p><em>Fate. We tried to fight it, Fang and I, to no avail. How could we? We needed a miracle, and yet for all we waited, it never came.<em>

_But fate was never our enemy, was it? It was, after all, what brought all of us together: unlikely heroes united by an impossible task. What began as a rebellion against an evil corporation became so much more. We can tell stories about it now, of how it all began with Sephiroth, or Shinra, or perhaps the fall of Jenova itself. But no—it all began with _her_. The one who would come to lead us to save the entire Planet._

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><p>Somewhere, within a city ringed by a series of the gigantic reactors that provided its lifeblood in the form of electricity, a train was running.<p>

Many such trains traversed across the circular city in an extensive system of rail that covered the entirety of the upper city. They were the fastest, and safest—this last quality demonstrated by the amount of red-uniformed operators, in charge of both security and the running of the trains—means of transportation in the city of Midgar. Yet this particular train was special.

The other trains did not run, for one, all the way to the Sector 1 Mako Reactor—one of the eight structures in the city that converted the raw Mako energy from the earth for use in generating electricity. And more importantly, the others did not harbor six terrorists bent on destroying said destination.

Its wheels screeched as it slowed into a stop, where two guards stood watch. A muscular dark-skinned man with fiery hair leaped off the train and landed easily on the ground. "Who are you!" the first guard challenged as he broke into a run towards the trespasser… but the frontal assault was too easy to predict, and the guard was easily thrown against the ground. The second guard rushed to his companion, drawing his weapon, but was immobilized by a second terrorist—a dark-haired woman. They were joined by two younger members of their group: one blue-haired, one blonde and distinguished by goggles and headphones. The four ran on ahead, turning a corner.

Next to leap off the train was a tall, powerfully-built young man, sporting a black bandana over the blonde hair, and a large trenchcoat. Last was a pink-haired woman: she vaulted off the train in a somersault and landed on the ground. "Yo, newcomer," the man said cheerfully, "follow me." With that he ran after the other four, not looking back.

The woman was military—any casual observer could tell that, even without her uniform. Her employer disappeared after the others of their fellowship, and before the woman could follow in his steps, two additional guards ran to intercept her. With the ease of one trained for the task, the woman drew her weapon—a Gunblade, an ornate cross of a sword and a gun—and shot them down, before following her employer into an alley.

The alley opened into a street, from where the group's target could be seen looming ahead: the Sector 1 Reactor. The woman saw the group assembled before a closed door, attempting to hack it open; her employer, the tall blonde man, was nowhere to be seen. One of the group—the muscular man with the fiery hair—greeted her. "Hey!"

The woman offered no friendly greeting to the man, who plowed on nonetheless. "So you're an ex-SOLDIER, eh? Not everyday ya find one in a group like AVALANCHE."

The black-haired woman—the one who seemed to have dressed for a day out in the beach, rather than a dangerous terrorist mission—looked up from her task of tinkering with the door mechanism. "SOLDIER? Aren't they the enemy? What's she doing with us in AVALANCHE, Gadot?"

The man named Gadot shook his head. "Hold it, Lebreau. She _was_ in SOLDIER." He sent a smile to the former soldier, although the latter still refused to reciprocate. "She's quit and is now one of us—right?" He shrugged. "Didn't catch your name."

"…Lightning."

"Lightning, eh? I'm Gadot, the kids over there are Maqui and Yuj—"

"I don't care what your names are." Lightning glared at the taller man, her eyes narrowing. "Once this job's over with, I'm out of here."

It was then that her employer finally appeared—the man in the black bandana. The man that Serah had recommended her to: Snow, leader of the terrorist organization known only as AVALANCHE. "Whoah, whoah!" he cut in, hearing only Lightning's stinging reply to Gadot, "save the talking for after the mission. We can't risk getting caught because of chit-chat." While Lebreau and Maqui worked on getting the gate opened, the man extended a hand to Lightning in greeting. "Snow Villiers," he introduced himself. "I've only heard of you from your sister—it's an honor to meet you."

Serah, her sister, had spoken of the group and its goal of saving the planet through some outlandish, destructive method or some other. _Quite frankly,_ Lightning thought, _I don't give a damn, Serah._ And yet she needed the money, and her training as one of SOLDIER—First Class, actually, an achievement rare and noteworthy for a woman—would make this job a cinch.

Of course, just because this man was giving her a job didn't mean she had to be friendly. She ignored the offered handshake, instead choosing to cross her arms. Snow shrugged, unoffended. "Our target's the North Mako Reactor," he told the entire group. "We'll meet on the bridge in front of it."

The teen Maqui rose with an exclamation of success. The gate drew open, and AVALANCHE was free to infiltrate.

Lightning was the last one through the gate. She took one last look at the reactor—an image that was familiar to anyone living in Midgar. It provided for everyone's well-being, allowed for comfort in the midst of a world fraught with danger for the human race… and here she was to destroy it.

None of that mattered to her. This was just a job—and she'd see it through no matter what.

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><p>"Yo!" The man's cheerfulness added to her dislike of him, even more so than her suspicions of the nature of his relationship with Serah. How did her eighteen-year-old get acquainted with a six foot seven terrorist like Snow, anyways? "This your first time in a reactor?"<p>

_What a stupid question._ "Don't be silly. I worked for Shinra, remember?"

Inside the structure housing the Reactor itself were massive pipes and machines, dedicated to maximizing the output of Mako. Noticing one of the huge, rusty pipes, Snow began, "The Planet is full of Mako energy—people use it every single day." The fact did not trigger a response on Lightning's part—every child living on this city knew _that_. "And they don't even realize—it's the lifeblood of the Planet being sucked out by Shinra with these weird machines."

The scantily-dressed woman, Lebreau, had stayed behind outside the actual innards of the Reactor—setting up their escape route. The others nodded along to Snow's speech—that's what the group was for, after all. Saving the planet from Shinra, or some other nonsense. "Spare me the lecture," Lightning said coldly, "and let's get moving."

Snow held up his hands in mock surrender. "All right, all right." He signaled to Maqui, who immediately keyed in a few commands to the control panel connected to the door that blocked their path; it slid open. "You'll be coming with me, miss ex-SOLDIER."

_Crap._ She resisted the urge to let out an exasperated sigh. She was beginning to wonder if this group was even capable of fulfilling a mission without some laid-back idiot botching it up.

They went on alone from there—the various enemies they had to cut down were growing noticeably stronger the further they went into the Reactor, and the other AVALANCHE members were not as experienced in combat. Even so, a few tentacled hounds and generic guards posed little threat to them—Lightning with her gunblade, alternating between saber and firearm, and even Snow with his bare fists, his strength enhanced by the special trenchcoat he wore. _He's not as useless as the others in his group,_ the ex-SOLDIER had to grant grudgingly as they finally reached their destination: the Reactor itself.

The leader of AVALANCHE allowed a low whistle of awe as he inspected the machinery. He wasn't, however, impressed. "When we blow this place, this'll just be another rubbish heap." He produced a small package from one of his trenchcoat's many pockets and tossed it to her. "You set the bomb, Lightning."

The reactor did not surprise her either, but something about it… _bothered_ her. "Shouldn't you do it?" It didn't look hard—turn a wheel here, key in a command there—but SOLDIER weren't used for the setting of bombs. Especially crude, homemade ones of dubious effectiveness.

"Nah. Gotta make sure you know how to do it, y'know? For future missions." What Lightning heard was, _Prove your loyalty to AVALANCHE_. She shrugged—she had severed all ties to Shinra long ago. What was a destroyed reactor to her, anyways?

_Watch out! This isn't just a reactor!_

"Anything wrong?"

Snow's voice snapped her back to reality. _What was I doing?_ The bomb was still in her hands. She shook her head—this wasn't any time to be losing her sanity. The bomb was set—easier than it looked, really. Whoever had designed this crude bomb had cleverly made it easy for any tech-deficient terrorist to handle it easily. "Sorry about that—it's done."

At that moment alarms went off—they had been discovered. "Heads up, soldier, here they come!"

To her relief it was just a machine. A rather large one, but a model that she recognized. "It's a Guard Scorpion!" Lightning yelled as she neatly dodged a jab from the scorpion-esque mech's deadly pointed tail. She sent forth a lightning bolt with help from the Lightning material embedded in her weapon, recalling that electrical attacks were effective against such mechanical enemies. Snow had no means of generating such electricity, but he made up for it with a defense that the huge scorpion could not penetrate.

That's when it raised its tail above its head, and ceased all other attacks. "Wait! Villiers, stop!" Snow barely managed to stop his last punch in time. "Don't attack when its tail is up, or it'll counterattack with a laser!" The man nodded in acknowledgment and held off on his attacks. There was a brief respite as the Guard Scorpion's tail hovered warningly above its head—but it had no means to fire it. Finally it lowered, and the two terrorists immediately followed with attacks that effectively blew the machine into pieces. They had won.

"That was awesome!" Snow held up a clenched fist in victory, grinning like a child. "Shinra's no match for AVALANCHE—"

"Don't celebrate just yet." Lightning thumbed her blade into a gun, and jammed it back into its holster. She walked to the bomb she had placed against the reactor's core, and her heart sank as she inspected the minutes left before detonation. "We have ten minutes left to get out of here," Light snarled at Snow, shocking him from his victory celebration. "Move it!"

Alarms had gone off with the Guard Scorpion's appearance, and they didn't let up as the duo backtracked through the maze of ladders and pipes. "H-Hey!" They turned to see Maqui, the blonde goggled teen, his leg stuck in the machinery. Lightning was forced to stop and help the boy retrieve his ankle, while trying her best to avoid scolding him. "Thanks, Lightning!" Maqui tested his leg tentatively on the ground, and followed them out.

The bomb exploded just as they poured out of the reactor and into the shelter that Lebreau had been setting up. Lightning had underestimated the strength of the blast; whoever had designed that bomb really _did_ know what he was doing. In terms of causing destruction, anyways. Almost as if he could read her mind, Maqui sent her a crooked grin. "Impressed, huh? Yuj and I've been workin' on that one for a while."

Lebreau patted the teen on the head playfully. "Stop showing off—need we remind you how many times you blew up our hideout with those toys of yours?" She tinkered with another bomb, much smaller than the one they had just set off. "All right everyone, get back." The woman detonated it with a thumbed command, and their little bomb shelter now had an opening to the outside. An opening that was spewing flame from the bomb, but nevermind that—Lightning and the rest leaped out easily, with Yuj barely escaping with slightly singed blue hair.

Snow gathered them all together. "Alright, mission accomplished—the Planet will live a little longer, because of what we just did. But it's not over yet, not by a long shot. We rendezvous at Sector 8 Station—get on the train back to the hideout, and plan the next mission." He grinned**—**something he did often and easily, Light noted, again with growing disapproval—and held up a victorious fist. "Remember! The army and Shinra..."

"—is no match for AVALANCHE!" the others finished for him, all laughing and exchanging high-fives.

The ex-SOLDIER was still not amused. When the others split into different directions, Lightning raised her voice before Snow could disappear as well. "Villiers! About my pay..."

At the word _pay_, Snow Villiers turned and chuckled uneasily. "Ah... about that. We'll save that talk for back at the hideout, alright?" Before Lightning could demand otherwise, he ran off in the other direction with a hand raised in farewell. "Remember, we meet at Serah's bar, in Sector 7!" For a man of his size and height, he moved quickly; before long Lightning was alone.

_What a mess._ She didn't have to fear on Snow reneging on her promised paycheck; Serah had given Light her word on Snow's credibility, and it wasn't in the ex-SOLDIER to distrust the word of her sister. And yet her suspicion was growing: just what was Serah's connection to Snow, anyways? She suspected she wouldn't enjoy the truth. Lightning shrugged, taking her gunblade in hand. She had a quick and easy way to sort out problems with the truth.

**To be continued.**

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><p><strong>This will probably be the longest AN in any chapter of mine. I tend to talk too much so I'll _try_ to keep things short here:**

**It all began with a YouTube comment on the opening cinematic for FXIII: "An ex-soldier and a black man on a train… WHERE HAVE WE SEEN THIS BEFORE". I promptly created a new game on FFVII (I mean, we all replay **_**that**_** one. Yep) and renamed Cloud 'Lightning', and my imagination ran rampant.**

**Anyways, a point that needs to be made clear early on: This is NOT just a simple narration of the game with different characters. All right, so it's easy to replace Cloud with Lightning—the latter having been based on the former anyways—but from there things get tough. Who can replace Barret? I can attempt to be hilarious and replace Barret with Sazh, but besides their long-ranged weapons, they have absolutely nothing else in common. Snow fits the bill as resistance leader to the ruling power, so I suppose Snow can fill in for our favorite gun-armed man.**

**Now, try finding a replacement for Tifa (Fang? -crack-), Aerith (...), Red XIII (I guess Hope could be a sort of puppy...), and the rest of the cast. Yeah... not happening. I did consider Fang/Vanille for Cid/Shera, but that means they'll appear late into the fic. And if I'm going to write anything remotely FFXIII-related, IT SHALL HAVE FANG AND VANILLE. Early.  
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**In other words: It's a better, more original fic if I 'rewrite' the game and keep the FFXIII cast relatively in-character. So Snow won't be shouting at Lightning, "Yo! Get your spikey headed ass over here!" He'll be courteous, and gentlemanly. Sort of. You'd want to be, anyways, if you want to score a Serah. And that's how I plan on writing this random crossover.**

**Some characters will have to remain FFVII instead of being replaced by FXIII. Aerith (I prefer Aeris. But eh), for one, is staying. Actually, now that I think about it, maybe Aerith should be male so there can be another love triangle. Or Light can have a wandering sexuality. You didn't hear that from me. Oh, and Vincent will be here, since there's no replacement for a man like that. Yuffie… I don't know her too well, so unless someone requests for that material-stealer to appear here… she's out.**

**Also, the 'villains' will be mainly FFVII. I rather like Scarlet (I'm not the only one who wants to read a slapping match between her and Fang, right?). And Sephiroth… yeah. He'd be scarier than a pope-esque old man like Dysley.**

**One last thing. I… haven't played FFXIII. If that wasn't apparent from my shoddy writing. ALL combat terms will be strictly FFVII, although I'll be implementing Eidolons into the story. Okay, I guess it's stupid to go "BOLT 2!" rather than, uh, "THUNDARA" (That's what it's called, right? o_o). I'll… get to that. Yeah. More importantly, PLEASE scream at me (in a nice and cuddly review) if you feel that any of the characters are getting out of character. I only have the cutscenes uploaded on Youtube to help me, and that's not a lot compared to the amount of info you can glean from having played the actual game. Sorry if I disgust you with my blasphemy of not possessing a 360/PS3. ;_; What can I say?**

**Reviews are loved. Constructive criticism (Again, I'm sorry if the characters go out of character o_o) is appreciated. I have yet to encounter the fabled 'flames' but I suppose that's not the end of the world.  
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	2. The Promise

**Chapter 2 ~ The Promise**

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><p><em>We all meet different people everyday. Whenever we met one another, before we made that final promise<em>—_we went on, never knowing that the first connection had been made. Some of those connections we make fade over time—they stagnate, or change, or are replaced by others. But the one bond that could never, ever be broken was that of two sisters, linked by more than just blood. One that not even Sephiroth was able to sever._

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><p>She had only been here before once—high-ranking Shinra personnel weren't, after all, normally stationed out in the slums—but it was easy to track down her destination: a bar, known as the 7th Heaven, where her sister worked as a bartender. Snow and AVALANCHE had already stormed in, scaring out all the civilians to free up the place for their secret meeting—and from the number of people streaming out of the doors, quite a number of Sector 7's residents were drinkers.<p>

One, however, caught Lightning's eye: a tall, dark-haired woman whose rather revealing clothing consisted of something that Light could only describe as… _primitive._ _A foreigner, perhaps?_ The woman was being herded out of the bar, and she shook her fist at Snow angrily. From her appearance alone Light gathered that she was not inexperienced in combat, and for a heartbeat she expected a fight to erupt—but a familiar figure rushed out of the bar, coming between the wild woman and Snow: Lightning's younger sister, Serah. She was apologizing profusely to the customer that Snow had chased out, handing to her what appeared to be a full refund in gil. The gift didn't seem to fully appease the strange woman, but the worst of her anger had passed; she snatched the proffered gil, and walked away grumbling. Serah shouted a last apology before returning inside the bar.

Snow stood guard just outside the bar, using his height and size to his advantage whenever some curious eye drew towards him. When he spotted Lightning, the man waved cheerfully in recognition. Another eyeroll on the former SOLDIER's part—her respect for him as a resistance leader was sinking, and fast. "Go right on in," he told her, letting her pass.

"Daddy—ah!" A little girl, perhaps four or five, realized that the woman wasn't her father—whoever the irresponsible idiot was, leaving a child of that age in a bar of all places. The girl scampered back to the counter, hiding behind another woman's legs.

"Claire!"

"It's _Lightning_."

That did not deter the young eighteen-year old. Serah Farron only smiled at Lightning's grouchiness—and immediately rushed forward to her sister with open arms. "Welcome back! Did you have any trouble…?"

Lightning crossed her arms, looked to the side, and scoffed. _Trouble?_ That was another word for the man, she supposed. "What was up with that woman Snow chased out?"

"Oh, she only came here asking about someone she had lost—if we'd seen her anywhere near here." Almost as if Serah could read her mind: "You didn't fight with Snow, did you?"

She would have had much and more to say about Snow Villiers, when said man barged in behind her. "Daddy!" The young girl escaped from behind Serah's skirts to greet him. Snow laughed, lifted her up high, and placed her easily on his shoulder. "Daddy, I missed you!"

Serah must have seen the look of shock and disgust on Light's face. "That's Marlene," she explained, smiling as Snow twirled the girl around. "I look after her when he's… out."

Lightning wondered who the mother was. Given her opinion of Snow thus far, she wasn't surprised if he happened to be a divorcee of a hasty, immature marriage and saddled with the monetary burdens of child custody. "Come on, both of you," Snow directed to them, carrying the giggling child on his shoulder towards the pinball machine against the wall. "The others are already downstairs, right?" Without waiting for an answer, he pressed a button on the side of the machine. The entire thing—Snow, the machine, and the wooden platform it rested upon—traveled slowly downwards. Light distinctly remembered—that was their so-called secret hideout, wasn't it?

Lightning was about to follow as soon as the machine rose again, but Serah stopped her. "All work and no play," scolded her younger sister. "Out from one dangerous mission and on to the next—why don't I fix you a drink?" Serah beckoned invitingly towards the counter—but Lightning shook her head. "Oh, come on—oh! A flower, Light?"

Lightning produced the petite flower from her carrying pouch and proffered it to Serah. "It's something I bought," she explained, "on the way." The small white flower had miraculously survived the rough journey on the way back to the hideout. Of course, it would _have_ to be sturdier than the average flora to have been grown in the environmental wreck of lower Midgar…

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><p>"<em>Hello," a voice called to the ex-SOLDIER from amidst the chaos. The bomb had sent people scattering in all directions in fear and shock as the power went out for a few agonizing minutes. Lightning turned around—it was another kid, around the age of Maqui and Yuj: 16, or perhaps 17. He had a basket of flowers dangling at the crook of his arm. "What's going on, miss?"<em>

_Perhaps it was the military appearance of Lightning, and her uniform, that caused him to ask that. Light shrugged, decided to lie. "Not sure, but it's chaos out here. Why don't you go back home?" The boy with the spiky blonde hair was about to turn, perhaps take her advice… but something made her call out to him: "Don't see many flowers around here." Actually, the basket made him an eyesore—what sort of man would be carrying around flowers?_

"_Oh, these?" The young man scratched the back of his head with his free hand, embarrassed. "I'm just selling them for my sister." When Lightning did not reply, he held the basket to her. "It's only one gil for one flower," he said enticingly._

Huh._ It was true, flowers _were_ rare in this city—the entire area where Midgar was built upon, as well as the surrounding countryside for miles all around, was devoid of flora, because of all the Mako that Shinra was sucking out—and it could be a rare, heartfelt gift for her Serah that at the same time didn't bankrupt her. Light pulled out a small coin from her pack, flipped it to the boy, and picked out a white flower. "Thanks, miss!"_

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><p>"A boy selling flowers, huh?" Serah giggled as Lightning tucked the flower into her hair. "You see something new everyday, I guess…" With a final, fierce hug, Serah whispered, "Welcome home."<p>

"This isn't home, Serah." Lightning held her sister at arm's length. "Not yet." With that she followed Snow and the others down into the basement, where she'd have to settle this issue with her money—civilly or with her gunblade in hand, either way was fine with her as long as it was Snow's face on the receiving end of the firearm.

The atmosphere of the hideout reminded her of those birthday parties back home at Nibelheim: cheering, smiles that quite nearly went ear to ear. The large television placed on one side of the room showed a shot of the explosion they had caused, and the news anchor covering the breaking news story was reassuring the people to stay calm, that Shinra would protect them from the destructive terrorist organization known as AVALANCHE—"All because of our bomb," Maqui boasted over the coverage. "We're literally _famous!_ Look at that blast!"

While Maqui and Yuj argued over who had contributed most to the creation of the bomb—which, Lightning suspected involved more contribution from some pyromaniac's computer website than anything else—she walked up to Snow, who was entertaining Marlene. "Villiers." At first the man pretended not to hear her, laughing in an uproar over some joke Gadot popped out, but Lightning slammed her fist down on the table beside them. _"Villiers."_

"Oh—Lightning!" Snow ignored the anger in Lightning's face when he nonchalantly offered her a drink. "Relax, sis, it was a mission well done—"

"I'm _not_ your sister." The room had gotten quiet, the only sound coming from the news on the television. "We had a deal. After the mission, you'd—"

"Wait!" It was Serah, who had followed her down; she threw herself between her and Snow. She twined her arm with his, and the look they shared should have told Light _everything_—but no, she had faith in her sister. She had faith that Serah wouldn't do something as stupid and idiotic as going ahead and—

"Lightning, Serah and I… are engaged."

For a heartbeat, the ex-SOLDIER did not understand the simple statement. It was when her sister confirmed it with the embarrassed look on her face that Lightning reacted. _"What?"_ When neither moved to defend themselves, she continued. "I ask you about my pay, and you bring this up?" She let out a laugh—a forced, choked laugh. "Full points for _guts_, Villiers.

"This is a _suicide_ group. Sure, you lucked out today—but once Shinra starts sending some real SOLDIER members down, you won't be so lucky. You'll always be on the run, once they find out about this little hideout. And you think you can say to my face that you're going to be _marrying my sister?"_

"We're not getting married until everything is over with," Serah protested. Lightning glared at her, but her sister was not so easy to cow. "After everything settles down, we can move to somewhere nice and quiet like Kalm—"

Snow punched his fist into an open palm. "Once we pull the fat Shinra corporates off their thrones, we'll be able to raise a family that won't have to live in a dump like this—"

"_Once you do?_ Didn't you hear me, Villiers?" Lightning drew her gunblade, clicked it into a saber, and pointed it at Snow's face. Gasps from all around the room—yet no one moved to stop her. "This is _Shinra_. They aren't a bunch of kids playing at war." At the word _kids_, her eyes traveled around the room and settled on Yuj and Maqui. "How could you possibly think you could defeat Shinra with the likes of these, without endangering Serah?"

"Claire, I—"

"And you." Lightning did not point her weapon at her sister, but her blue eyes burned with disapproval. "What possessed you to tag along with them?"

Snow answered for her. "For the good of the Planet, Lightning—"

"_Shut up."_ If he was going to launch into yet _another_ speech about some bullshit about the 'good of the Planet', she was going to have to pull the trigger. All this idealism and naïveté was making her sick. "I'm out." She slipped her weapon back into its holster, satisfied when that single action released all the visible tension in the room. "I'm going upstairs. And I want to talk about my money, Villiers. Now."

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><p>"Listen, Clai—Lightning. I'm asking you—please join us."<p>

"In what? Your doomed marriage or your suicide mission?"

Serah let out a defeated sigh. "We won't bring up the engagement again, I promise. Not until everything's over and we can settle down someplace nice, together." She paused, as if waiting for Lightning to step away from the exit or to take a seat. Lightning only crossed her arms, tapping her foot impatiently. _Say what you want,_ her eyes told Serah, _and say it quick, before I walk out of here._ "It really is about the Planet, Light—it's dying. Slowly, but surely, it's dying. Someone has to do something."

"Then leave it to Snow and his gang. It has absolutely nothing to do with you, and especially not me."

"So you're just going to leave?" Serah asked angrily. "You're going to walk out on your sister?"

Lightning wanted nothing more than to be able to walk away from that, without a backwards glance… and yet she knew, much to her chagrin that she could not. Her sister meant much more to her than that. "I'm not going to leave you."

"Then what are you doing now?" Before Lightning could reply to that, Serah had donned a look of hurt, and accusation entered her voice. "You've forgotten the promise we made, haven't you?"

"What promise?"

Serah took a step back, hesitant—then took a seat at one of the abandoned tables. "I can't believe you've already forgotten. Remember—it was seven years ago, in Nibelheim…"

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><p><em>A fourteen-year-old Lightning—no, Claire Farron—sat on the platform of the town's water tower, swinging her legs over the edge impatiently as she waited. Finally her sister arrived, sleepy but curious. "Sorry I'm late," Serah yawned, twelve years old. "What did you want to talk to me about?"<em>

"_Come this spring… I'm leaving for Midgar. To join SOLDIER."_

"_I didn't know there were girls in SOLDIER."_

"_There are—we just don't hear about them much. But you'll hear about me." Lightning clambered up to the very top of the water tower, admiring the silent moonlit town from her high perch. "I'll be the best there is—just like Sephiroth."_

_Everyone, even her sister, knew who Sephiroth was. The war hero, who had won fame in the recent war on Oerba. "Maybe we'll hear about you in the newspapers all the way out here in Nibelheim, huh?"_

_Claire laughed—something that her current twenty-one year old self found hard to do. "I'll try, Serah."_

"_Hey, Claire. Let's make a promise."_

"_A promise?"_

"_Well, it's nice if you become famous and all, but…" Serah paused dramatically—a natural actress. "If I'm ever in some kind of trouble I can't get out of… you'll save me, right?"_

"_That's silly—you've been reading those fairy tales too much, Serah. I'm your _sister_, I don't have to promise—"_

_Serah's face had taken on the likeness of a puppy dog: her eyes were large and pleading as she looked up at her sister. "Come on!" she begged. "Just promise me! Humor me, at least?"_

_Overhead, a falling star blazed a trail of bright blue in the night sky. "Fine. I promise, Serah—I'll protect you, always."_

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><p>Serah was impatiently tapping a foot on the wooden floor. "Remember now, Light?"<p>

It was so like Serah to hang onto such a naïve, childish promise. "Don't be such a child, Serah. That was seven years ago." Even so, her sister refused to budge. "The war ended before I joined SOLDIER. I never became famous, not even a hero. I can't keep that promise."

"But you made it in, didn't you? Not a lot of women even make it into SOLDIER, much less First Class!" Light looked away angrily—why couldn't Serah just understand? "Please—you have to fight with us! Everything that happened in Nibelheim five years ago… it was Shinra's fault, wasn't it? We can't just let them have their way all the time!"

_Five years ago._ A mere half of a decade… and yet it seemed a world away, in a separate universe. _That doesn't matter to me anymore._ All she could do was mutter, "Sorry," and turn to leave. Snow wasn't going to pay her—why wait for the impossible?

"Here, miss ex-SOLDIER!" Lightning turned just in time to snatch the bag of gil that sailed through the air towards her. It was pitifully small, but the weight felt about right: 1500 gil. "As promised."

Such a sad, pitiful life she led. She clutched the money angrily; part of her screamed at her to fling it to the ground and leave—but something stayed her hand. _It's Serah,_ Lightning realized. No matter what her sister did, no matter what kind of stupid choices she made—Serah was her sister. They had lost both their parents in that incident five years ago, hadn't they? _She's all I have._ Snow was insidiously creeping into her life, in ways that Light disapproved of—after all, Serah was only eighteen—and yet, what kind of sister would abandon that sister?

"This is my pay? Don't make me laugh." For a second Serah's face was twisted by despair, Snow's by defeat… and that made the next words all the more satisfying: "I'll do the next job for double this."

"_Three-thousand—_" Snow almost choked on those words, and Light's spirit lifted almost sadistically. "But sis—"

Serah immediately took Snow's arm, and had to go up on the tips of her toes to whisper loudly in Snow's ear. "Come on, we're hurting for help, right?" Serah looked at her sister gratefully. "We had some money saved for Marlene to go to school, but…"

Light approached her sister, ruffled her pink hair—like she used to do. Her sister blinked from the unexpected show of affection. "I was joking. Two thousand, then." The ex-SOLDIER suppressed a laugh from the visible relief on Snow's face. She'd go along with AVALANCHE, Lightning decided. She'd stay close to Serah, and study this Snow Villiers, the man who saw himself worthy of Serah's hand. And if he didn't pass Lightning's test of approval… She frowned. At least she had her trusty gunblade. "And I'm not your sister."

The issue of Snow Villiers was for later, though. For now, all that mattered to Lightning was the sisterly love reflected in Serah's eyes. "Thank you."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Alright. I lied. There is no Aerith... but in her place is a certain blonde spikey-haired protagonist we all know and love (or love to hate, whichever be the case). Be warned, though—I lowered his age, and am using his personality as shown in **Crisis Core** (A game that I won't be borrowing much plot elements from, mainly because... I can't remember most of it). Can you just _imagine_ said protagonist walking around selling flowers fer a gil each? Augh.**

**Anyways. I understand that the crossover 'genre' doesn't have much to offer, hence the teeny audience. And whatever is in the FFVII/FFXIII crossovers out there appears to be mainly gushy CloudxLight fics, which I don't approve of because it's FLight all the way—*shot* So I'll try my best to finish this for the sake of hobby writing, rather than reviews. :') Although they help mightily. Like, really.**

**Thanks for reading!  
><strong>


	3. Flowers for Hope

**Chapter 3 ~ Flowers for Hope  
><strong>

_Hey, are you all right? Can you hear me?_

"Yeah."

_Back then, you could get by with just skinned knees._

"'Back then'? What are you talking about? Who are you?

_Don't worry about me. Why don't you try getting up?_

"Fine." A grunt of surprise from a third observer.

_That's it—little by little. Get up!_

"Miss! Miss, are you all right?"

Lightning opened her eyes. Sunshine was streaming through a roof of colored glass, although the large hole in said roof could have had something to do with the lighting. She groaned and propped herself up with one arm. She was lying on… _flowers?_ "You're in a church in the Sector 5 slums," a boy explained. He pointed to the hole in the roof. "You fell from the sky!"

_From the sky?_ It took her a few minutes of wracking her memory: _Serah, and Snow!_ She had been on that mission to bomb the next reactor, and Serah had left the bar under Lebreau's and Marlene's care to tag along with Snow and Light—and no amount of arguing would change her mind. Shinra had anticipated their move, and intercepted their escape route with a so-called "techno-soldier" called the Air Buster. After they had fried every circuit in that robot's motherboard, it had exploded and—

It had blown a hole in the bridge they were standing on, and Lightning had fallen. Looking up at the distance she had fallen, she shuddered; it was pure luck that a church and a flower bed had been there to break her fall. Speaking of flowers… She got up immediately, still shaky on her legs. "Sorry about the flowers," she apologized to the curious children around her. She recognized one, however, because of his height compared to the other children, and the spiky blonde hair. "It's you!"

"You remembered me?" The young man grinned uneasily. "I'm Cloud. We live here," he explained, beckoning to the other children. They were unkempt and grimy, although their faces were in awe of this woman who had fallen from the sky. "We sell the flowers that grow here to get by. It used to be that another girl took care of us, but…"

"I miss Aerith," one of the children sniffed, clutching a single white flower to his chest. "Where is she? Why'd she go away?"

Mention of the girl's name had raised over plaintive queries from the children, and the young man in charge of them, Cloud, seemed unable to answer. "So where's this Aerith now?" Lightning asked.

"The Shinra." Cloud herded the children together, tried to hush their cries. "They took her away, not too long ago, without telling any of us why." His fists clenched, his blue eyes darkened. "If I had been stronger, I would have…" He didn't finish the thought, only lowered his head. "You're from Shinra too, aren't you?"

"I used to be. How'd you know?"

"Your eyes." Cloud stood up, peered at them in an awkward silence. "Aerith had a friend from SOLDIER once. He had the same eyes." He shrugged, evidently uneasy on the subject. "Didn't catch your name…?"

"Lightning." She gave herself a quick pat-down—no broken bones, her gunblade still in place—and started towards the doors of the church. "I can't stay here." She had to go find Serah, and fast. In some other life, she would have tossed several gil to the homeless children, sympathizing for their helplessness… but that wasn't who she was. Not anymore. She cast one final glance at the ragged bunch, but Cloud had already turned away.

On the way out she almost bumped into someone else—a woman, with pale silver hair, accompanied by a boy with similar coloring. _Her son?_ "I'm sorry," the woman apologized, draping an arm around the boy's shoulders, "we're just passing through."

"Into the church?"

"Yes." The woman pulled out a small bag, weighed down by its contents. "You were just in there, weren't you? We come around every week to help out in any way we can. You know—food, clothing." The woman gave her a casual up-down, and commented, "Not many from SOLDIER would be in a place like that. Or anyone from Shinra, for that matter."

That even this civilian mother would suspect about her origins did not rest easy with Lightning—Shinra valued their SOLDIER members. After that tangle with President Shinra himself just before the Sector 5 Reactor's explosion, they'd be sending some men to bring her back—alive or dead. "It's a noble cause you're working for," Light told her. "I—I have to go." Mother and son both turned, to go on their way… "Wait! Do you know the quickest way to get to Sector 7 from here?"

The woman's face brightened. "Why, of course! You just have to make a turn over there, pass through an old playground…" Her voice faltered when she saw the blank look on Lightning's face. "My son can take you there if you'd like," she offered.

"What! Mom, what are you—"

"Hush, I can go on myself." The mother looked up. "I'm Nora," she introduced herself, extending a hand. This time Lightning did not refuse the handshake, as she had with Snow. "And this is my son, Hope. We pass through the area often—he knows where to take you."

"Lightning. Pleasure to meet you." She hoped her face wouldn't betray her true feelings—the woman's offer of her own son as a guide was generous, yet she wasn't a babysitter. Rather than refuse this woman, though—she was an unusual character, helping out orphaned children—the best course of action would be to get back to Sector 7 as quickly as possible, and send the boy back home. "Aren't you worried, though? The slums aren't the safest place for children."

_I'm not a child,_ Hope muttered under his breath, although the two women took no notice. "I'm sure someone from SOLDIER can protect my son," Nora smiled. "And every son wants his mother to stop fussing over him once in a while." With a final hug, they departed. "Call me on your cell if anything happens!" the woman called.

"You have a cell phone?" Lightning had never shown much interest in the gimmicky devices. Electronics broke easily in her line of work, after all.

"Yeah. My mom gave it to me in case I get kidnapped, or… if anything happens." The boy was shy, it was plain to see—although, with a name like his and a haircut that was reminiscent of a pixie's…

They took longer to reach the playground than Lightning expected; the way had been filled with obstructions of waste and debris, characteristic of the poorest sections of the slums. Hope looked at the derelict amusements offered in the park: a swing set, a sandbox, a slide. "Mom sometimes brings the kids out here," he said, almost to himself. "Even Cloud plays with them, a little." The boy sat down on the bottom of the slide, panting—he wasn't nearly as physically fit as the ex-SOLDIER; Light looked the other way as he caught his breath.

"So what's up with that Cloud? He doesn't look like the kind of person who would be bothered about a few children."

"I don't know him too well," Hope admitted, "but he used to tell me stories about some friends he made. The flower girl who looked after the kids before she was kidnapped by Shinra, and her boyfriend—some bigshot from SOLDIER. He disappeared a few years ago—no one knows what happened to him." He looked up at her in awe as he continued, "Mom said you were from SOLDIER. What rank were you?"

"First Class."

"Oh. Same as him."

"Maybe I knew him—did you get his name?"

Hope would have answered, but the huge gate just beyond the edge of the playground had opened with a crash. Out came a Chocobo-drawn carriage, gaudy and excessively decorated. The gate crashed to a close behind it as the carriage made its slow procession. _Rich bastards,_ Lightning thought, until she noticed the young woman riding in the back of the carriage. That was—"Serah!"

It was impossible to say whether her sister heard her, before the Chocobo pulled the carriage away. Lightning was about to chase it down when she remembered the fourteen-year-old boy she had with her. "Who was that?" Hope had a strange look on his face. "If she's going to Wall Market in that get-up, then…"

Lightning wasn't sure she wanted to know—and the boy was too innocent, or embarrassed, to say it out loud anyways. "That's my sister—I have to go find her." Nevermind that she was dressed like an exotic prostitute—her sister could have lost her senses to the point of marrying Snow, but selling her body was beyond the range of possibility. Something was wrong—perhaps Shinra had finally captured AVALANCHE, as Lightning had suspected would happen sooner or later from day one—and she would be damned if she didn't do something about it. "It's not too far from here to the church—you should get back to your mother, and quickly."

"Wait! Take me with you!"

She turned reluctantly, crossing her arms and raising an eyebrow, and waited for the boy to explain himself. Hope looked helpless as he flailed for a believable excuse. "I have to meet Don Corneo," he explained. "He's—he's the one running the…"

"Pleasure house?" she offered.

"…in Wall Market. Mom—she really wants to have Shinra send some soldiers to kick him out, so maybe if I… got some inside information…" He trailed off.

Looking after the naïve Snow and her sister Serah was bad enough—now she was being saddled with a teenage boy whose idea of a weapon was a boomerang. And from what she gathered from Hope, Wall Market was no place for children, much less teenage boys. Lightning frowned, but somehow some spark of conscience prevented her from sending the boy off on his merry way. _How bad could it be, dragging some kid through a market?_ And the ex-SOLDIER had to admit, grudgingly, that the boy was talented with the use of Materia. She had given him just a few of her leftover ones, and he was quite the backup support. "Are you sure?" Hope nodded fiercely.

"How will you get into his mansion? Don Corneo's, I mean."

They had started walking, following the path of the carriage that had carried Serah away. Hope had told her that this "Don" was in the business of pleasure, for lack of a better term. Such a man would never allow a soldier towing a boy along behind her within his mansion, she reasoned—but if Corneo was anything as Lightning suspected, he had one unfailing weakness: Women. All she had to do was follow Serah's fashion style and play the part of a cheerful, upbeat schoolgirl… right?

As for Hope… Lightning took a quick peek at the boy. _He kind of looks like a girl._ It's the hair, Lightning thought, definitely the hair. She could almost hear Serah's voice whispering in her ear: _All he needs is a little make up and some nice, girly clothes..._ "Hope, have you ever worn a dress before?"

* * *

><p><strong>AN: All right. I'm sorry. I lied again. All this time I've been flailing for a FFXIII replacement for Aerith, went as far as to introducing an AU Cloud, and finally I've decided there won't be one strict replacement. I mean, the plot is predictable for anyone who's played FFVII (And who hasn't, right? Cough cough), but I want the story to become less 'predictable', especially when it's being acted out by vastly different characters. This just shows how little I've actually planned this fic out in stone. Reviews give me weird ideas.**

**That aside, oh goodie! Next chapter will be my favorite part of the game (and will also, hopefully, be much longer in length to make up for this one)! We've always known that Hope was destined to uphold the cross-dressing legacy. Wall Market is pure awesome.**

**Chapter title is homage to a rather well-known book. Not that I'm suggesting Hope is mentally deficient. It just sounded nice.  
><strong>


	4. Trap

**Chapter 4 ~ Trap**

"No! I'm not putting that on!" Hope refused to look at the dress that Lightning had shown him, the one that she had gone through absolute fetching hell to procure.

Lightning suppressed an angry snarl and let out a sigh instead. At least it wasn't as bad as when she had tried to convince him to wear the bikini briefs that she had gotten from the Honeybee Inn. _Listen, kid,_ she could have said, _I just went through some embarrassing shit involving a lot of naked women and a bathtub for this._ All in all, the ex-SOLDIER did _not_ wish to be reminded of her experiences at the Honeybee Inn—and in the end she simply let it go. But the dress was crucial. "You can put this on like a good girl," Lightning managed through clenched teeth, "or I can go on alone to Don Corneo, while you run back home to your mother. Your choice."

"…Can I keep my clothes on underneath?"

"Fine." It wasn't noticeable, anyways, and Lightning wasn't about to carry his clothes around so he could change afterwards. "Now get in there and change. And don't forget the tiara." That was a nice touch—it went well with his hair, or so she believed.

The boy who stepped out of the dressing room could have fooled even her. The tailor and his daughter, who ran the clothing store, were likewise stunned. "Not bad," the tailor said, inspecting the dress from behind the counter. "We could make a business out of this. Just take the dress for free—it's on the house." _Thank the Maker,_ Lightning thought. The thing looked like it would cost a fortune.

Her face must have shown something. "What is it?" Hope asked grumpily. He kept turning around, trying to see the back of the dress. "Did I zip it up right?"

Instead of answering, Light towed him to the tall mirror in the clothing store. Once he saw himself, his face twisted in a mix of shock ("I really do look like a girl") and disgust ("I look like a dork!"). "If I do say so for myself," Lightning drawled casually, "you make quite the young woman, miss Hope."

Hope glared at her. "Aren't you going to wear one too?" he said, accusing.

_Oh, crap._ She had almost forgotten about that. "Well, go on, _miss_ Lightning! I'm not going to go in there dressed like this myself!"

She had probably as much experience as Hope did when it came to dresses. She had picked one out almost similar to Hope's, one that allowed her to wear her normal clothes underneath. She had to adjust the belt straps that held her gunblade's holster, but concealing the weapon was, thank the Maker, easy to conceal. Since Hope's silver dress had highlighted the color of his hair, she decided to follow that with a pink one. _If Hope lets out so much as a giggle,_ Lightning thought as she exited the dressing room, _I will murder him._

No tittering greeted her—not even a single smile. _Is it that bad?_ "Hold on, I can change to another one—"

"No, no," Hope choked out, his face red. "Y-You look great, Lightning. You really do."

"You do," the tailor confirmed. Light shot the tailor a glare—_Not helping,_ her eyes told him. "That one _will_ cost you, though." She resisted the urge to sigh again when she counted out the gil on the counter—Snow would _have_ to pay her double, at the rate she was being forced to spend on her mission to reunite with Serah, else she'd have to go find a real job soon.

"Don't say anything once we're there," Lightning advised Hope. "I'll do all the talking." For all appearances, the boy wasn't even getting to that stage of growth yet—though his voice was unmistakably male. Awkward. Now the boy was trying—rather unsuccessfully—to walk without tripping over the dress. "Remember, you chose this, Hope."

"I know," he wailed, "but… I…" He didn't finish the thought, only twisted around again to look at himself helplessly. "This is ridiculous. It's never going to work. It's not going to work, it's not!"

That was what he kept muttering under his breath while they trudged through Wall Market, even as they cleared the security guard outside Corneo's mansion. The guard asked what was up with the cute one, and Lightning smiled as sweetly as she possibly knew how. "She's just nervous for her big night with the Don."

"It's not gonna work, it's not gonna work…"

"Will you please _be quiet?_"

That shut him up, and made him look around for once instead of at the ground, to make sure he didn't trip. "_It worked!_" _Really,_ Lightning thought sarcastically, although she didn't say it. "So what do we do now?"

For answer, Lightning led the way up the stairs where there were doors. She tried one unsuccessfully, considered breaking it down, and let it go—they had gone through hell to make this disguise work, and they sure as hell were _not_ going to blow it so soon. The second door was locked as well. That left only the gaping passage at the end of the corridor, which apparently led downstairs. _A basement? For what?_ And then she knew.

Torture devices served as sadistic furniture in the basement, lit only by a dim lantern. Lightning had to squint, to pick out the human-shapes and figure out whether it was some torture rack or some shape of her sister—_"Claire?"_ Serah's incredulous voice came from a figure that Light had dismissed as a mannequin. "What are you—why're you dressed in—no, forget that, _you're safe!_"

Light pulled herself out of their embrace, even as Serah clutched at her desperately. "I'm all right," she said irritably to all of Serah's queries about her well-being. "Considering I fell quite a few stories after that disaster of a mission. What I'm concerned about, Serah, is: _why are you here?"_ When Serah's gaze trailed away to something behind her, Lightning remembered. "Oh. This is Hope, some… kid who showed me the way here."

"How _old_ is she? How can you bring a little girl with you here, Claire?"

Hope was, yet again, helpless. "_He_ can look after himself just fine, Serah." Serah peered at Hope's face, as if trying to figure out just how this pixie could be male. "Where's Snow? If he has anything to do with this, I'm going to—"

"Relax, it was my idea." Lightning frowned at that, and raised an eyebrow in a gesture that said, _Go on._ "It started when Snow caught a shady man, after we got back from the mission. Apparently this Don Corneo sent him to find some information—so I decided maybe I could try finding out some information on him, instead." She motioned to her dress—specifically chosen for the way it revealed her body. "Anyways, Corneo's looking for a bride. Every night he gets three new girls, chooses one, and… you know."

"And Villiers sent you out knowing you'd be seducing a lech like this Don Corneo?"

"No! He—Snow doesn't know." Serah looked at her feet. "Anyways, I need to be chosen by Corneo if it's going to work. But since you two are here…"

"…it doesn't matter who he chooses, so long as you know all three girls," Lightning finished. At that, Hope looked up quickly in confusion. "If he's okay with it…"

"Huh?" Hope had tuned out of the conversation, and wasn't expecting to be dragged into it. "Wait. So you're saying… the Don is going to pick one of us, and then he'll…?"

There was an awkward silence. "Should we…?" Serah asked her.

Lightning shook her head. "Nothing's going to happen—if Corneo tries anything, we can all fend for ourselves." Or so she hoped—Serah had that gimmicky bow-blade she had been using during their mission (hopefully it was concealed somewhere in that provocative dress of hers), and Hope could always fry him with a quick Fire spell. As for herself, her gunblade had two options of dealing with one indulgent Don Corneo. Hope's eyes widened as he connected two and two and realized what exactly the two sisters were planning—but he didn't complain. If anything, he looked even more like a girl whenever his face flushed like that.

"Hey! It's time, ladies—the Don is waiting!"

"You heard him," Serah chirped, adopting a cheerful attitude to lighten up the mood. "I heard he's too fat to really try anything, anyways." _That doesn't help at all,_ Light thought.

Her sister was right, unfortunately. The Don was a sow in silk, near-sweltering in the unventilated room. As soon as they had lined up in front of him, he pounced on his desk in glee. "Good, splendid!" He licked his lips as he drew closer to inspect them personally, his small, leering eyes peering at them hungrily. "Which one shall I choose, eh?" He lingered in front of Serah, and Lightning tried her best not to rip off the costume and stick the end of her gunblade into that pig's face. _He's going to choose Serah,_ Lightning thought with alarm. Then the man turned her attention to her, and her thoughts went for the worse. _Crap, crap, crap!_

"I choose…"

_Shit—_

"…this wonderful little fairy!"

It was all Lightning could do not to gasp. "M-Me?" Hope stammered, blushing crimson again. "Wait a sec—I mean, please wait a moment!" His voice was perfectly feminine once he was faced with the terror of being _chosen_ by this pig of a man. But hopefully Corneo would change his mind—

"Woohoo!" _There goes our luck._ "She's even playing hard-to-get!" He took Hope by the arm, fairly half-dragging him away to a back room. "You can have the other ones!" he told his guards, who subsequently turned hungry gazes towards Serah and Lightning. "Let's go, my pretty!" he crooned. The last thing Light saw of Hope was his helplessly huge eyes, screaming _Help me!_

Things had just gotten a lot more complicated.

* * *

><p>None of this would have happened if he had just <em>shut his mouth<em>. If he hadn't suspected of Lightning's affiliation with AVALANCHE, if he had just abandoned her from the moment the ex-SOLDIER asked him if he had worn a dress before.

"Is the little doll shy? Don't worry, papa'll be gentle…"

None of this would have happened if he weren't such a _girl._ The image of his reflection came back—how girly he looked. _It's the hair. Definitely the hair. _As soon as he phoned his father and got back home, he'd get a new haircut, pronto.

"Don't you like me, my little pixie?"

Hope was shaken from his self-deprecating reverie when he realized that the Don was waiting for an answer. The man was on his bed, trying to coax him closer; all the Don was doing, however, was making Hope wish for a weapon like Lightning's to replace his silly boomerang. _What was I thinking, bringing a toy like that as a _weapon?What he needed was a knife—no, wait, what he needed to do was answer the Don. _What did Lightning and her sister want, again? Information?_ "I, umm…"

Don Corneo reared back in suspicion. "There… There isn't anyone _else,_ is there? That's it, isn't it! An adorable little pixie like you wouldn't help but attract several admirers, am I right?" _As if. _And if someone used the word 'pixie' to describe him one more time, he was going to have to send a Bolt spell up their—"Come on, you can tell me! Who is it, this charmer who's captured my pixie's heart?"

_Here goes._ "I-It's… Snow." He didn't even know _where_ that name came from—Serah had mentioned it earlier. _Didn't Lightning call him by his last name?_ "It's Snow Villiers."

At first the name made no impression on the Don—until Hope added the surname. "Villiers? Sounds familiar…"

"You know," Hope tried, "he's the one you were trying to find out about." That _was_ what Serah had told Lightning in the basement, right?

A miracle—the Maker must listen to him after all, if sporadically. Recognition lit up Corneo's face as he exclaimed, "Ah, yes! In Sector 7 in the slums…" _Yes! I did it!_ "And how does a little pixie know about _that!_" _Oh, crap._ Not a miracle after all. It was time to ditch the outfit.

He had planned on ripping the flimsy thing away and tossing it to the side, but life wasn't as easy as a video game, apparently. _Crap, how do I get out of this?_ Before the Don could make another move, however, the door slammed open, and Hope recognized the _click_ of Lightning's gunblade. "Get back, you freak," she advised him coldly, training the weapon on his shocked face. "Serah, help Hope out of that thing." Luckily the lighting of the bedroom masked his red face as the young woman moved to help him out of the thing. He didn't know if he would ever be so glad to be back in his normal clothes again.

"W-Who are you!" Corneo crawled further away on the bed, but didn't risk diving for the exit—not with the gunblade pointed at him by a woman with those eyes. _Mako-infused eyes,_ Hope remembered, almost with relief. "What the hell is going on?"

"Shut up. We're asking the questions now." Lightning clicked her weapon back into a saber, although her eyes were still trained on Corneo. "What did you send your men out to find?" The Don was hesitating. "If you don't tell us…" Lightning leaned forward and placed a boot on the edge of his bed. "…I'll slice them off."

Even Hope understood what she meant by "them". The boy shuddered, and thanked the Maker that they were on the same side.

Corneo was not so lucky. He nearly jumped, and blubbered, "No, not that! I-I'll tell you everything, I swear!" Another look from Lightning's eyes: _Go on._ "I had them find out where that big man was—you know, Snow Villiers. B-But that's what I was _ordered_ to do…"

"By who?"

Corneo flinched. "No! If I told you that, I'd be killed!"

"Talk!" Hope surprised himself by the fury of his demand. He followed Lightning's example, and placed a foot on the edge of the bed. "If you don't talk…" He reached back for the Fire materia that Lightning had lent him earlier, and lit up a living flame on his open palm. "…I'll burn them off."

Corneo was fairly crying now from fear. "W-Wait! It was Heidegger, from Shinra! Heidegger, Head of Public Safety Maintenance!"

Lightning and Serah shared a knowing glance, while Hope flailed inside. _Heidegger? So it's true! Light and Serah, they're from AVALANCHE, that terrorist group!_ Hope hardly had any time to think. "Shinra?" Corneo nodded frantically. "What are they up to? If you don't tell us…" Serah pulled out her mechanic bow. "…I'll shoot them off."

"Y-You're all crazy," Corneo whimpered. "But it's hopeless, Shinra isn't fooling around! They're trying to crush that rebel group AVALANCHE by finding out where their hideout is—and they'll crush them, _literally!"_ For a cornered man faced with three armed threats surrounding him, he was gaining some bravado as he spoke of Shinra. "They're going to break the support holding up the plate above them. After that, everything's gonna go BAMM!" He wasn't even afraid anymore, his eyes glowing as he emphasized on that last sound effect. "We found out that their hideout is in the Sector 7 slums… far away from here in Sector 6."

_Oh Maker,_ Hope thought. _Mom and I were going to Sector 7, right after the church!_

"They can't do that!" Serah shouted, shaking her head furiously. "They'll wipe out the entire slums just like that?" She turned to her sister, trembling. "Cla—Light, we _have_ to get back to Sector 7!" The ex-SOLDIER nodded, and both started moving towards the exit, with Hope following confusedly behind. _Dad wouldn't let that happen! It's impossible!_

"Just a second!" Corneo had moved to one of the edges of his bed.

Lightning turned to him dangerously. "We don't need anything more from you, pig."

"Just wait! It'll only take a second." None of them understood the look on Don Corneo's face. "How do you think scum like me feels when they babble on about the truth?"

"Quite frankly, I don't give a damn, Don Corneo," was Lightning's caustic reply.

"_Bzzt!_ Wrong answer!" With that he flipped a lever, and suddenly there was nothing below Hope's feet but darkness. _It's a trap!_ Hope tried to cry out, but it was too late. His thoughts went to his mother—_I have to go warn her!_ It was too late for that, too. There wasn't anything left. Only the dark…

* * *

><p><strong>Wow. Did I mention how much I love Wall Market? Yes, yes I did. True, when I first played the game (wee six year old) I didn't know what the heck Cloud and co. were talking about when they said they'll "rip them off". And the Group Room in the Honeybee Inn… I thought the entire place was like, a karaoke place or something. It's good to be young.<strong>

**I'm sorry I'm cheating on descriptions when it comes to cross-dressing Hope and Lightning in a dress. The last time I wore a dress was for graduation and that is **_**not**_** happening again. I know as little about dresses as Hope, really. Really. The whole thing was interesting to write, anyways.**

**Final note: Hope's really important! Really! And speaking of which—I had to go on Urban Dictionary and look up 'trap' in the not-so-obvious sense, hence the title. I feel so naughty. Anyways, next up: Pillar bombing. Where we meet the awesome dude (not in Advent Children. But y'know) known as Reno, and a certain spearchi—I mean, spearwoman showing up to join the party.**

**Thanks for reading!  
><strong>


	5. Pillar

**Chapter 5 ~ Pillar**

"_Snow, listen to me! They're going to destroy the Sector 7 slums by detonating the pillar support! You have to get everyone out—"_

It had been a relief to hear Serah's voice again, even if it was only over the phone—until the news had been delivered. Gigantic pillar structures held up the upper world of Midgar from the slums below; if the pillar supporting the Sector 7 plate was destroyed, then the entire plate would come crashing down with heedless disregard for the lives it would snuff out of those living below. _Damn Shinra!_ And their hideout—how was it discovered, anyways? This Don Corneo sounded like just any other fat indulgent getting fat on riches, but to be a _Shinra spy_…

Too late for that now. Snow clenched his fists, wishing for the fat face of President Shinra to bash in. _I should have given him a good one when we met at the Number 5 Reactor._ For now, though, the slums were in danger—and he had to save them. "Listen up, everyone!" Lebreau, who ran the 7th Heaven bar alongside Serah, was able to convince the entire village to come out and gather to hear what he had to say. "We have to evacuate the slums immediately! Shinra is detonating the pillar holding the plate above us, and when that happens no one will survive!"

As expected, the news raised uproar. "It's your fault, AVALANCHE," roared one man, "for going against Shinra! Now they're destroying our homes to get rid of you guys?"

That was the truth, and even Snow couldn't deny it for a happier lie. "That may be," he said through clenched teeth, "but we're not going to just sit by and watch. The slums are our home just as much as they are yours. We'll be going up that pillar and shooting down any Shinra that dare come near." Gadot had dumped their stash of Shinra-issue weapons, hoarded over months of clashing with the Shinra Guardian Corps, in front of him. He picked up a rifle, raising it high above his head. "All we ask is: will anyone stand with us?"

More people than he had expected rose up in unison—some hesitatingly, others without a trace of doubt on their faces. Even Nora, the woman Snow had met a few times, the silver-haired woman who often came around the slums to hand out supplies to the poor, stood up and took the gun from him easily. She didn't even _live_ here in the slums. _She's not part of this—she's innocent,_ Snow thought futilely, watching as the others outfitted themselves with all manner of weaponry. _They're all innocent. _And yet Shinra would destroy them all the same. _Actions speak louder than words. What will your actions say about you now, Shinra?_

* * *

><p>As soon as the monster that had ambushed them after their fall, Serah fell to her knees, ignoring the grime on the sewer floor. "It's too late," she whispered bitterly, her bow-blade clattering to the ground beside her. "Once they bring the plate down… It's too late. Marlene, Snow, everyone in the slums…"<p>

Hope surprised Lightning—the kid was, if annoying, filled with unexpected surprises. "It's _not_ too late!" he said fiercely, shaking Serah by her shoulders. She looked up at him in awe. "We can get back to the slums and warn them before it happens, right?" The girl nodded slowly, her tears already drying on her face. "We can't give up," Hope repeated, "not yet."

"You're right. And we need to get you back home to your mother, Hope." Lightning shoved the gunblade back into its holster—how amazing it felt, not to be hampered by that ridiculous dress. "Call Snow, Serah, and warn him. The sooner we get back, the better."

The sewer had opened up to a train graveyard, where discarded locomotives lay forgotten in the wasteland of rubble. Most of them weren't functioning, of course, although some were. Hope had taken to the wreckage like a duck to water; he experimented with some of the levers in the rusting trains and set to work on clearing a path. "He's really cute, isn't he?" Serah said as the two watched Hope wrestling with a particularly stubborn old train. "C'mon, admit it, Claire!"

"He's just a helpless kid." _Who isn't a part of any of this,_ Lightning thought guiltily. "We have to get him home. And you too—you have to get away before Shinra blasts that pillar."

Serah pulled away from Lightning in protest. "I have to help Snow and the others! I can't just run—"

"Hey, over here!" Hope waved an arm from atop a train. He had cleared the way, maneuvering the few functional trains to clear the tangled wreckage that had previously blocked their path. "We can go through here!" The boy joined them, oblivious to the conflict between the two sisters. _Why does she have to be so stubborn?_ Lightning fumed as they picked their way through the obstacles in their way. _This is all Snow's influence. Once this is all over…_

Before she could finish the thought, she stopped short on reflex. "Do you hear that?" The others looked at her strangely while she tried to pin down the direction of the noise. "It's _gunfire._" Sure enough, as she picked up her pace, she could see the light of the Sector 7 train station just ahead. "We're here!"

They all ran past the station, the gunfire increasing in intensity with every step they took. The station was crowded with civilians climbing over each other in their haste to board the train out of the war zone, although even more were toting guns and climbing the pillar. _What's going on?_ Lightning's eyes traveled up the pillar, trying to seek out the familiar black bandana and beige trench coat. "Look, Light! Up there!"

An explosion at the very top of the pillar—and something human-shaped fell, plummeting to the ground. Before anyone could move, it slammed into the ground with a sickening _thud_. "Maqui! Maqui, is that you?" Serah rushed to the boy's side, trying to hold back the tears and preparing a Cure spell while Lightning and Hope watched, horrified. "Maqui, speak to us! Where are the others? Where's Snow?"

Only after Hope added his healing powers to Serah's did Maqui open his eyes weakly. He raised a shaking hand to point at the top of the pillar, from where he had fallen, and where the gunfire was the most intense. "Up… up there. Snow got a lot of people to fight with us against Shinra, but… but it wasn't any use." He coughed up globs of blood that spotted his clothing. "You have to go up there, Serah. You have to get them all out before they…"

Serah shook her head. "Don't… Don't push it, Maqui. Just rest." He managed only a weak smile before his eyes glazed over, and his chest stopped heaving; the only movement, then, was Serah as she tried in vain to stifle her sobbing. "Lightning…"

"No." She knew what her sister was going to try to do—and she would _not_ let Serah go the way of Maqui. "Listen, Serah." Lightning knelt by her sister's side, and took her by the shoulders to force her to look at her eyes. "Marlene—Snow's kid—has to be taken someplace safe, right? And Hope—he needs to find his mother, and get back home. I'll go on ahead and help Snow, while you two find a safe place."

"But Claire—"

"_Lightning._" She drew her gunblade, looking up at the pillar. _That's a lot of stairs to climb for someone like Snow._ Yet she had promised her sister to protect her—and if protecting her fiancé was part of that, then she'd do it, gladly. "_Go,_ Serah." This time her sister went, dragging a frantic Hope away as the boy vainly searched the many faces of the crowd for his mother.

She was going to force her way through the crowd to start her flight up the stairs, but a voice cut through over the clamor. "Oi, soldier!" Lightning turned to the unfamiliar, accented voice to face… _It's her!_ That woman who had been chased out of Serah's bar, the one whose foreign clothing marked her out like a sore thumb. "They're fightin' Shinra up there, yeah?" The woman approached her, and this time she had a weapon in hand—a double-bladed lance, ornately decorated yet simple in its deadliness. "If so, I'll be joinin' you."

"Why?" Lightning looked dubiously at the weapon the woman wielded. It didn't look like it could handle enemies that were all sporting firearms; it was medieval and outdated, really, and her airy clothing wouldn't stop Shinra's bullets. Yet she couldn't deny the strength in the woman's toned muscles, the scars that marred the tanned skin. _Better then going up alone…_

"They took something from me, and I need it back." The woman shrugged. "Besides—it's hard to find someone _not_ hatin' Shinra for some reason or other in this place. Or any other place, for that matter."

_Any other place… she _is_ a foreigner._ "Who are you?"

"The name's Fang." She twirled the spear expertly and gave Lightning the most crooked grin she had ever seen, one that mocked her uptight mannerisms as befit her as a former SOLDIER. "Now then, sunshine. Are we goin' up or not?"

* * *

><p>At first he had expected Serah, once that telltale pale pink hair came into view, making its way up to the top of the pillar where he was fighting off a few Guardian Corps—but no, it was her sister. "Sis, you came! Where's Serah?" He eyed Lightning's companion suspiciously—hadn't he seen that woman before?—but ignored it; if it meant more firepower against Shinra, then by all means, bring it.<p>

"I'm not your sister," Lightning reminded him sharply. "I had her go find Marlene and get to someplace safe." Her gunblade was slicked red with the blood of the enemies they had encountered over the many flights of stairs that they were forced to climb, and it wouldn't be getting any cleaner just yet; a helicopter was circling the pillar, shooting at them, and Snow had no weapon other than his fists. "Get back!" She clicked her weapon into a gun, aimed, and fired; it was only then that she realized the helicopter was no mere Guardian Corps. _The Turks!_

The black business suit that leaped out of the helicopter confirmed her suspicions. The Turks were not Shinra Guardian Corps; the Turk that leaped out of the chopper neatly dodged her gunfire, ducked under Snow's fists, and vaulted over Fang's spear, making his way to the bomb control panel. "Watch it!" the Turk said innocently. "You'll make me press this button to detonate the pillar—oh, whoops." He callously pressed the flashing button, and answered their horrified expressions with a grin. "That's all, folks! Mission accomplished."

Snow roared in anger. "_Disarm_ it, you bastard! You're killing innocent people down there!"

The large man assaulted the business suit, only to be repelled by the weapon the Turk pulled out: a taser in the form of a rod resembling a nightstick. "Disarm? No, no, can't have you three doing that." No one gets in the way of Reno and the Turks."

* * *

><p>It took one last blow to the side of his face from Snow's fist for Reno to finally stop his attacks, doubling over in pain. Yet even in defeat, the cocky redhead managed a grin, looking up at his three attackers insolently. "Time to go," he rasped. He found the strength to escape by flying over the edge of the pillar, plummeting downwards until he was caught by the Turks' chopper. Lightning almost <em>threw<em> her weapon at the chopper in rage, yet knew it wouldn't do anything. _The coward!_

"Light! Come on, help me try and disarm this thing!"

Snow was helplessly keying in commands into the bomb panel, although this control was nothing like the homemade bombs Maqui was fond of making. With every failed attempt, the detonation timer ticked down even faster; Snow finally gave up and threw his arms into the air. "You try, Lightning!"

"This is ridiculous," came Fang's growl. "Let _me_ at it." She shoved Lightning aside, ignoring her protests, and eyed the flashing lights curiously. _She doesn't even know what the hell is going on!_ And Lightning was right: "If it won't stop, then I'll just..." She raised her spear and brought it down in a powerful arc, destroying the panel in a shower of sparks. "There, I fixed it—"

"_Fixed it?_You just destroyed our only chance of stopping the bomb! What the hell have you just—"

A cold laugh interrupted her tirade. "Don't bother trying to teach technology to natives, ex-SOLDIER. The slums are doomed anyways." The chopper had stopped circling to let another black-suited man to step out. _More Turks._ "Only a Shinra Executive can set up or disarm the Emergency Plate Release System. You guys never even had a chance."

"Get down here and disarm it, now!" Lightning fired her weapon at the chopper several more times, although the Turk was unfazed. He reached back into the chopper, and half-dragged out a young girl with pink hair... _"Serah!"_ How did they capture her sister? What happened to Hope, and Marlene?

"_Serah!"_ Snow raged helplessly, lacking any long-range weapons. "Let her go, you bastard Tseng! If you want AVALANCHE, take me instead!" He clenched his fists, thinking of all the people who had died on this pillar. Not only the rest of AVALANCHE, but the innocents who had risen to defend their homes as well. _Nora._ The silver haired woman had been one of the last to fall; she had sacrificed her life to save Snow's, throwing her dying body before him to shield him from a volley of murderous bullets.

The Turk shook his head. "We're not interested in you, Mr. Villiers. Our orders were to capture one Serah Farron. It said nothing of AVALANCHE."

_Nothing of AVALANCHE? So they're taking her for some other crime?_It made no sense. And it almost made Lightning's heart wrench when Serah looked up—not at Light, but at her fiancé instead. "Snow, she's all right! Aerith's place—" Tseng slapped her sister before she could go on. "Please, everyone, get out!"

Tseng chuckled at that last pleading note from Serah, but frowned when Fang stepped forward. "Hey, Lightning's sister!" Serah looked up, her eyes widening in recognition of the woman. "Tell _Vanille_ I'm coming for her! I'm bustin' her out of there, you hear me? _Tell her—"_ The chopper rose abruptly, so Fang's words were lost. "Come back here!"

So that was why. The Shinra had kidnapped someone close to Fang as well. "It's too late for that," Lightning shouted at Fang, pulling her away. The chopper was already disappearing into the distance, undoubtedly headed to Shinra Headquarters. "We have to find a way to get out of here!" Already the huge concrete holding up the plate was starting to crumble in a blaze of explosive flame; soon the entire Plate would come down on their heads.

"Sis, here!" Snow waved them over; he had taken hold of a large wire, attached onto the bottom of another plate. "We can use this to get out!" Lightning didn't even bother correcting him this time, as she half-dragged a furious Fang to their one shot at escape. She dumped the woman on Snow's lap, ignoring both of their protests; Snow was the only one large enough to hold the wild woman down. She had to hang onto Snow by clasping her arms around his thick neck, ignoring her own discomfort. If they could get out of this alive, she'd give all the hugs Snow needed. "Hang on, everyone!" The large man leaped off the edge of the pillar with the two women hanging onto him for dear life.

Behind, the Sector 7 pillar was already crumbling—the mighty structure that once held up a Plate and all the living people atop it, reduced to nothing by the simple act of activating a bomb. More than just a Plate would come crashing down with that tower; the pillars of so many lives would come crashing down as well. And the ones responsible for it—the last remnants of AVALANCHE, with a foreign woman warrior in tow—were fleeing without once glancing back.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Sorry. Really bad chapter, but tough to write (especially when most of this part in the game is mostly fighting enemies and running up stairs). Good news for me: took the time to finish FFVII again. I will never, ever name Tifa 'Fang' again—she was one BAMF powerhouse, but I never realized what an insecure girl Tifa really is :l Then again...  
><strong>

**(After regaining Cloud's [renamed Lightning] identity and his confession to the rest of the party about the truth of his past) Fang: "You're sure messed up, Lightning!"**

**Vincent: "I let the one I loved, the one I respected most, face the worst."**

**Fang: "So the punishment was sleep? That's weird."**

**Great non sequitur stuff, totally Fang-esque. Next playthrough, though, I'll name Tifa 'Vanille'. **

**I also (accidentally!) failed the slapping match against Scarlet, because I was cracking up over how Fang was calling her an old wench. Sigh.**


	6. Tear Down the Sky

**Chapter 6 ~ Tear Down the Sky**

"_Damn it!_" Snow's curses roared over the lonely emptiness of the destroyed playground. He pounded a gloved fist against the rubble that blocked the way back to what had once been the Sector 7 slums, before the plate had come crashing down. "_What the hell!"_

Fang watched him vent out his frustrated rage, sitting atop the ruins of the playground's slide set. The world had so much more people than she had seen from her years growing up in the sheltered settlement of Cosmo Canyon; if she was going to survive long enough to bring Vanille back safely home, then she had no choice but to watch and observe these strange people and adjust her actions accordingly. So far, from watching Snow at his tantrum, Fang guessed he was rather… simple.

"_Gadot! Yuj!"_ The large man gave up pulling apart the rubble blocking the way; for all his strength, he could not force tons of collapsed city-structure to budge an inch. _"Lebreau, Maqui!"_ He took a deep breath, filling his lungs with air, and let it out with one final roar: _"MARLENE!"_

Fang turned her green-eyed gaze to Lightning, who was likewise staring back at her. She didn't need to have been born in Midgar to recognize _military_ when she saw it. The ex-SOLDIER wasn't bad—that funny gun-sword-whatsit was an unpredictable weapon, and she wielded it masterfully; her physical form wasn't bad, and she _was_ rather attractive to boot. Easily more interesting than the blustering Snow, if a little stiff and unforgiving.

"So who's this… Vanille?

Oh, right. She _had_ been screaming like a possessed madwoman at the helicopter earlier, hadn't she? "A friend."

Lightning crossed her legs; evidently she wasn't going to let the interrogation end so easily. "A friend that Shinra was interested in enough to kidnap her?"

"That's what I want to know." Fang leaned back, closing her eyes as images of that fateful day swamped her mind's eye. The day when men dressed in strange black suits had come from seemingly nowhere, taking Vanille away in one of their strange mechanical flying machine things. Fang had set out the very next day, vowing to hunt down those men and return Vanille to where they both belonged: in the safe warmth of Cosmo Canyon, together with Bugenhagen. "They didn't even say why they wanted her—they just took what they wanted, and left. Like your Serah."

"It's _his_ fault." Lightning shot a glare at Snow, who was too far away to hear their conversation. "You don't resist Shinra without suffering consequences."

Fang examined Lightning's face as she said her next words. "But you're not going to let them keep your sister."

"Of course not. Consequences or not, she's my sister. I promised to protect her."

The word _promise_ tasted like ashes in Fang's mouth; she had promised Vanille as well, ever since both of their parents had passed away. And she had left the Canyon with another promise made to their adopted grandfather: _I promise I'll bring her back._ So far she had not been able to fulfill both.

Time to change the subject. "Shouldn't you calm down the big fella?"

"Why? He's had this coming."

"Seems to me that he's been screamin' Serah's name more than just a few times. If you're going to save your sister, better take him along."

Lightning _hmphed_ and turned away angrily, but her stubborn dislike of Snow failed to hold; they had to do _something_ besides sit here and mope. "Snow. _Snow._" The man barely heard; only at the second prompt did he finally silence his roars and calm down enough to listen. "Marlene's alive."

Snow looked up incredulously. "H-How?"

"I sent her and another kid to go find Marlene and take her someplace safe. She must have been caught by Shinra from somewhere—"

"And where's 'someplace safe'?" Fang pointed out. "It could be anywhere in this hole of a city—"

She was interrupted by a sudden series of beeps. Lightning fumbled around her vest, pulling out a little box-thing—a communicator of some sort? The ex-SOLDIER looked at the small flashing screen, and held up the device to her ear with a frown. "Hope? This is Lightning—wait, _Marlene?_" She stopped short, listening intently to what the voice on the other side of the communicator was telling her. "All right. We'll be heading there now."

At mention of Marlene's name Snow had grown agitated again; only a warning glance from Lightning kept the man from snatching the communicator from her and exchanging a few words of his own. _Who's Marlene?_ Fang wondered. _Some kid?_ "She's safe," Lightning said slowly, enunciating on _safe._ "She's called through someone else's phone—the kid that I sent Serah with."

"And where are they?"

"Some flower girl's house. It's in Sector 6—not far from here."

A sudden burst of energy invigorated Snow; all at once the frustration on his face turned to grim determination. "What are we waiting for? Let's go!" He started running ahead, leaving Fang and Lightning to follow. Already Snow's energetic attitude was starting to rub Fang the wrong way—she anticipated loud, idealistic speeches about heroism and altruism in the future. But these were the only company Fang could find in a hostile environment such as Midgar; she'd be forced to tag along for now.

Besides… Fang looked up at the sky—or rather, the ceiling made of steel, concrete, and Mako pipelines. Somewhere in that upper world, Vanille was waiting—and Fang would tear that false sky down with her bare hands if it'd save her friend.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: Ridiculously short chapter - I was planning to add the reunion with Marlene as well as the 'shiny golden wire of hope', but it's been a while since the last update and I find that it's hard to start writing for something after leaving it for a good month or so. ; So that's for the next chapter. As always, do feel free to scream at me whenever someone's going out of character. Thanks for reading.  
><strong>


	7. Elmyra

_AN: Well, great. Not only have I lost interest in Final Fantasy for the past few months—I also lost my outline for this entire story. (Not that I went too far in the outline—I think I only planned up to like, Cosmo Canyon) Even lost my early-written Chocobo chapter. Also lost whatever work I had for this chapter, too. Much rageface. Who knew flash drives were that flimsy?_

_Note: I've a feeling that, while this chapter will be longer than the previous one, it will also be very dull. If there are people actually following this: please bear with me; I still want to finish this, but my interest in Final Fantasy over the past several months has waned... and I hardly even remember where this story left off. Not to mention: this entire fic was a guinea pig of sorts; I hadn't done much "human" fanfic writing prior to this one, and I wanted to experiment. If my experimenting leads to overall suckish quality of writing... … I'm sorry ;_; (Oh goodness, I can only imagine how many inconsistencies there might be in this chapter...)_

_Positives? Not much. The story's still at a stage where it's very much a rehash of FF7 (albeit with different dialogue, of course, given that there are different protagonists). Must. Go. Further._

_Anyways, enough of that. Hello again to this humble crossover..._

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 7 ~ Elmyra<strong>

How could this have happened?

Shinra's television broadcasts were their only source of information until Lightning could return and tell them more. He tried not to let the tears show—they shamed him, in front of Elmyra and the little girl named Marlene—but still they dripped down.

_Investigations all point to the terrorist group "AVALANCHE" as the culprits responsible for the bombing earlier today, that brought down an entire Plate on all of Sector 7—_

_Liars_. If Hope hadn't been at Don Corneo's with Lightning and Serah, he wouldn't have argued against the word of Shinra—but he _had_ been at Don Corneo's, and he knew the truth: Shinra had destroyed Sector 7. Shinra had killed Nora.

Remembering that triggered yet another flood of tears. _It isn't fair!_ How was it fair for Nora—kind Nora, who lived a warm and sheltered life on upper Midgar yet regularly visited the slums to provide for Sector 7's orphans—to have been caught in all this? It wasn't fair, it just wasn't. The stupid terrorists should have been the one killed, not Mom—_they_ were the fools who tried challenging Shinra. And Hope knew—you can't challenge Shinra. Not if you didn't want to throw your life away.

And Father. What was _he_ doing, up in that fancy skyscraper that Shinra called their headquarters? _You knew Mother was in Sector 7!_ Hope wanted to scream into his phone. _You could have stopped the Plate from falling!_

He needed someone to blame. His father was an obvious candidate, and at times he even felt uncontrollable rage towards Lightning and her sister as well—but no, they were not the ones to fault. He couldn't place his finger on it, that pinnacle that would be the recipient of all his grief and rage—until he remembered a name: Snow Villiers. Leader of AVALANCHE. The one responsible for starting this mad rebellion in the first place.

_Snow Villiers killed Nora._

He repeated it again and again in his mind, until it lay etched within his very being. For Hope was no longer the shy, quiet boy who stood back to do nothing but watch. No, that boy was dead. He was still Hope, yes—but he was different now. He had a mission to fulfill, a mission that might finally leave his anger-filled heart at peace.

Snow deserved to die. Hope would make sure he did—and soon.

It had been a surprise to see those flowers blooming in the church, tended to by that spiky-haired youth—so imagine her shock at the bright yellow petals that literally covered the entire area in front of the house where Serah had supposedly left Marlene and Hope. Even Fang—who so far in their short time together displayed an upturned noise at the lack of nature and greenery in the slums—was impressed. She picked a nearby flower, breathing in its scent. "Nice place Serah's found," she commented.

Well, no use standing about. Lightning knocked twice on the wooden door; immediately there were footsteps rushing to greet them. The door opened to the face of a middle-aged woman, her face wrinkled with more than just age. "Serah?" She shook her head, blinked twice, and peered closer at Lightning's face. "No—you must be the one she was talking about. Her sister." She opened the door wider; from her eyes Lightning could tell that the woman was hesitant in allowing Fang into her home, but apparently Snow was a familiar figure. "Come on in—you're Snow, right? Your daughter is right upstairs waiting, she's been waiting ever since the news told us what happened—"

"Marlene!" Snow rudely pushed past Lightning, nearly knocking over a vase in his rush to scale the stairs to greet his daughter—but this wasn't the time to get annoyed at him. Not now.

Lightning observed—as any soldier would—and once she had inspected the small living room sufficiently, she turned her attention to the woman who had let them in her home. "Who are you? How do you know my sister?"

"I'm Elmyra. Aerith's mother." Lightning's expression was blank—_who?_ "Oh, I'm sorry—I knew you and Serah were sisters, so I thought you knew..."

Yet another reminder that her sisterly relationship with Serah was... complicated.

"Well..." Elmyra walked into a kitchen, returning with a hot kettle and three dainty tea cups. "It's a long story." Another way to say, _Sit down and have some tea—you're not going anywhere anytime soon._ "It all started when we discovered that Aerith was an 'Ancient'..."

"So basically," Lightning said slowly after Elmyra finished her tale, "Shinra's kidnapped your adopted daughter—Aerith—so that they can find something that they call the 'Promised Land'." She set down her empty cup. "So why would they kidnap Serah? She's not part of these—Ancients, whoever they are. Was it just because she and Aerith were friends?" It made sense if they were trying to keep her hostage, to keep the survivors of AVALANCHE in check—but none of this business of extinct human races made any sense.

"I don't know," Elmyra confessed. "And I haven't heard anything of Aerith lately—once they took her, and she never came back." Lightning had the grace to look away as a fresh tear revealed itself. "Shinra, the Turks—they never tell us anything."

"Who cares why they took her?" Until now Fang had remained silent ever since they had entered the house. She leaned back against a wall with arms crossed—the perpetual outsider—and continued, "You're going to break them both out of wherever they're bein' held, right?"

"Of course. I made a promise." The voice came from the stairs leading above; Snow was standing there with Marlene perched atop his shoulder. "I don't care what those bastards throw at me. I have to save Serah—_and_ avenge AVALANCHE."

"So you want more fighting?" To Lightning's surprise it was Elmyra, the quiet housewife who had little to do with these events in the first place, who spoke up. "You want to drag that sweet child of yours into another disaster?"

Snow's exterior wilted—but instead of backing down or retaliating angrily, he set Marlene down on the ground and set a large hand on a small shoulder. "I... I know I haven't been the best father for her," he admitted. "Maybe it's best if we just let Shinra alone—I learned that the moment they brought down that Plate. Maybe all this is just impossible."

"So why do you keep insisting on—"

"I told you. They took Serah. I don't know why they took her—but they're probably holding her hostage. It's my fault she's gone—and if I don't clean up my own mess, then who will?" Snow let out an embarrassed half-chuckle, half-groan. "Although you're right—I can't bring Marlene along." The girl pouted but said nothing; Snow tussled her hair playfully. "If—If it's not too much to ask...?"

"You want me to look after her." Elmyra let out a sigh, although the exasperation was feigned. "Alright—as long as you don't get yourself killed." There was a glimmer in the woman's eye; some spark of hope, perhaps? _When the Shinra took her daughter,_ Lightning realized, _she lost everything. Like me. Like all of us._

"So what about the boy?"

Oh—Hope! She felt some remorse; she hadn't even remembered that the teen was also in the house—upstairs, perhaps. "We have to leave him here," Lightning said firmly. His magic could be useful, but he had a mother and home to get to; this was no mission to take a fourteen year old boy along. Nora was at the church, not far from Sector 7—but she must have gotten out safely; Hope would be able to contact her easily with his phone. "It's too dangerous—"

"_I'm coming._"

The silver haired boy slowly descended the stairs, one hand firmly gripping the banister. "They took Serah to Shinra Headquarters. I'm going there with you."

"Out of the question. You'll stay here until your mother can come pick—what?" Lightning was forced to rethink when Elmyra shot her a warning glance at the mention of _mother._ It couldn't be—or could it? Realization dawned on her; of course Hope would want to come with them—because he didn't have anywhere else to go. _Nora—that was her name—Nora is dead?_

With that in mind she paused, let silence take hold for a few seconds, and began again. "It'll be dangerous," she said, knowing that her warnings were futile. "This isn't Don Corneo we're dealing with anymore; it's _the_ Shinra, the most powerful group of people on the planet. And you're still sure?"

Hope nodded vigorously. "I have to get some answers. Shinra's just been lying to us over and over again, haven't they?" Lightning couldn't begrudge him that; already Snow was nodding at the boy in approval. "I... I know Nora would have wanted that."

Two down, one to go. "What about you?" She turned to Fang. "Still bent on saving your friend? I've never been to the Headquarters—but it's no secret that it's locked up tighter than the prisons we'll be rotting in, if this mission fails."

"Prison, eh." Fang let out a snort—half contempt, half "bring it on". "Do you have to ask? I'll take whatever you've got in this _prison_ of yours."

Would it kill her to be a little more realistic?

_This is crazy._ Shinra Headquarters—the base of the entire monopoly, all in one imposing skyscraper. Roboguards, SOLDIER ranking all the way up to the esteemed 1st Class... and here they were, preparing to take them all on with one rogue SOLDIER, a teenaged boy who could pass as a young girl, a hulking terrorist leader with no terrorist band, and an indecent huntress with absolutely no regard for danger.

This, Lightning thought, would go well.

* * *

><p><em>AN: Oh crap, crappy ending, crappy writing, crappy everything.<em>

_Again: I swear this has a unique plotline D: Somewhere... later... Heck, I need to skip so many little details (ie. The fight with Air Buster, before Lightning/Cloud dropped through the roof of the church? Or perhaps the entire trek through Train Graveyard, summed up in a measly paragraph or two?). In my defense... you have to admit FF7 and FF13 are pretty darn similar. (NOT JUDGING I SWEAR)_

_Forgot what I was going to say. So I'll just... submit this. Thank you for reading. ^^_


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